Wallaby bolter Matt Giteau is desperate to jump back into action after his nightmare introduction to Test rugby last week.

Selected to tour even before he has played a Super 12 match, the Canberra tyro will have another chance off the bench in Saturday's Test against Italy.

Giteau, who turned 20 on tour in Buenos Aires three weeks ago, was thrown into the deep end and floundered in Australia's 32-31 loss to England last Saturday.

Coach Eddie Jones sent the utility back on at five eighth to add spark, hooking 66 Test veteran Daniel Herbert when Australia was down by one point with 10 minutes to go in front of a boiling 75,000 Twickenham crowd.

But rather than producing a Hollywood finish, the youngster threw several bad passes, lost the ball in crucial positions and his kicking was askew as Australia failed to snatch the win.

"I wasn't really happy with the way I went but having said that, I was extremely proud to get my first cap," said Giteau.

"It was the sort of game when there was a lot of dropped ball and bad passes.

"Eddie showed a lot of confidence in me to throw me on at that stage and I thank him for giving me the opportunity to get my first cap and I really want to do it again this week."

Jones acknowledges the importance of keeping faith with Australian Under 21 star Giteau who, he says, has progressed enormously through training with the senior players on tour.

Jones said he would definitely get his second cap this week at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris.

"Even though he made a number of mistakes (against England), he's impressed us on tour," Jones said.

"In the context of where we were in the game, he was the best player to come on. I'm not going into the reasons why we replaced other players but he was the best option.

"He is a chance to start this week, but probably not.

"The Italians can be quite ferocious at the start of a game so we'll probably bring him on toward the end of the game."

Although he looked it, Giteau said he didn't have a chance to get nervous.

"I was stretching then I got the call, I didn't hear the first time because it was so loud and then he said `you're up', I didn't really have time to be nervous," he said.

"It was a great experience and it was a great game to be a part of.

"I didn't feel that much pressure, compared to other games it was a bit faster and decisions had to be made a bit quicker."

Apart from keeping confidence in Giteau, Jones has no choice but to select him in the 22 with only 23 fit players, including the bare minimum of 10 backs, to choose from.

The injury hit squad suffered a further blow when backrower David Lyons, who trained for the first time on tour on Monday night, broke down at Tuesday morning's session and was unlikely to play on Saturday.

Lyons hadn't played since August after his hip flexor injury took a lot longer to heal than anticipated.

Already a considerable underdog, Italy's task has been made even tougher with champion goal kicker Diego Dominguez ruled out of Saturday's Test after damaging ligaments in his right knee in the 36-6 defeat at home to Argentina at the weekend.

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